Mom Diana Zhou called 'selfish' for costing BASD upward of $200,000 in special ed fight

Is she a steadfast advocate for her boys or selfish? Federal court hears both sides in special education lawsuit.

August 06, 2012|By Steve Esack, Of The Morning Call

PHILADELPHIA — Diana's Zhou's sons were so brilliant in math, the Bethlehem Area School District accelerated their learning as part of their gifted status under state special education laws.

The district transported Zhou's younger son, J.Z., from his fifth-grade class at Farmersville Elementary to East Hills Middle school so he could learn with sixth-graders. Her eldest, M.Z, was taking 11th-grade math as a freshman at Freedom. He was on the cross country and debate teams, participated in the school play and served as vice president of his homeroom while getting additional services for Asperger's, a form of autism, and auditory deficiency as required under federal special education law.

But those "appropriate accommodations" — which state mediators and hearing officers said met the boys' needs — were not good enough for their mother, according to testimony Monday in a rare, two-pronged lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia.

Diana Zhou went from being an articulate advocate for her children's education to a selfish mother, district lawyer John Freund said. In the 2001-02 school year, Freund said, Zhou began fighting the district's special education plans so officials would cave to her demands to send her boys to private school.

Suing Zhou in 2009 was the only way to stop her "relentless campaign" that had cost taxpayers nearly $200,000 for legal costs, a Mandarin Chinese translator and substitute teachers who had to be called in when full-time staff had to attend one of two dozen special education hearings.

"We don't think this case is about special education; We don't think this case is about the Zhou boys," Freund said. "What this case is about is a Mrs. Zhou, about a mother who went too far, whose selfish actions cost … a district with limited resources."

But Zhou is the real victim, said her lawyer, Kelly Darr of the Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania. There is no evidence Zhou ever wrote the district's legal problems would go away if it sent her children to Moravian Academy, and the lawsuit is nothing more than a retaliatory strike against a caring mother, Darr said.

The federal Individuals with Disabilities Act gives Zhou the right to disagree with school officials over her children's special education placements, Darr said. It does not cap how often parents can seek due process hearings to seek changes to children's placements, she said.

"She just wanted to get what she thought were appropriate programs for her children," Darr said.

Those two images emerged for the eight-member jury and Judge J. William Ditter. Zhou, who holds a master's degree from Arizona University, sat with her legal team while her two sons, now a 13-year-old freshman and 16-year-old senior, were in the audience taking notes.

The district brought the lawsuit against Zhou under a provision in federal law. It allows districts to sue to try to recoup legal fees for frivolous or extravagant legal challenges special education issues.

Zhou filed a counter-claim, alleging retaliation, and is seeking to recoup her own legal costs. Ditter will rule on the district's complaint; the jury on Zhou's.

The boys' names were revealed in court Monday. To protect their privacy, The Morning Call is using only their initials, J.Z. and M.Z., which are in court documents.

Initials, alone however, were not enough to protect the boys, Darr told the jury. Although Zhou still owns her Bethlehem Township home, Darr said, she moved her children to North Carolina during the 2011-12 school year because news articles caused undue hardship for them.

Richard "Ric" Agretto, the district's special education director from 1992 until his retirement in June, said the district won each time Zhou filed a complaint with a state mediator or due process hearing officer. She was the only parent in his 19 years as a director to challenge a hearing officer's ruling, he said.

Agretto also said he wrote Zhou a letter on Dec. 11, 2008, in which he denied her request for the district to send her children to Moravian Academy, which costs $23,000 a year and does not have to abide by special education laws. Five days later, she filed another due process complaint, he said. As costs mounted and the boys' education was in jeopardy, Agretto said, he had no choice but to ask the district's lawyers to sue.

"This is not personal," Agretto said. "I like Mrs. Zhou. She is highly intelligent. She drives her boys hard. … All I wanted was for the costs incurred to the district, to the taxpayers to stop."